Scalable Cleantech and ICT solutions for societal needs

The Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation, Tekes, and the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India through Global Innovation and Technology Alliance (GITA), will jointly fund Indo-Finnish research, development and innovation (RDI) cooperation projects. Funding will be available for challenging company-led RDI projects with a specific, but not exclusive, focus on Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SMEs).

The aim is to stimulate innovative RDI projects that address a specific market need or challenge that is solvable through Cleantech or ICT applications, demonstrate high commercial potential, and lead to favorable societal benefits in India.

Successful projects will be funded by Tekes in Finland and by GITA in India. Tekes funds projects through the BEAM – Business with impact 2015–2019 programme in collaboration with the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland (MFA).

The joint projects must meet the requirements of the funding organisations. For the Finnish part of the project, the funding terms of Tekes and the BEAM program will be applied. For the Indian part of the project, the general funding terms of DST/GITA will be applied.

In connection with this call our Indian funding partner, Global Innovation and Technology Alliance (GITA), have identified the following companies that actively are seeking Finnish collaborative partners: Tracking Sheet. This is not an exclusive list and applicants are naturally very welcomed to identify other relevant company and research partners in India through their own channels.

Timetable of the call

Launch of the request for proposals: May 13, 2015Last date of submission of full proposals: October 19, 2015Funding decisions: January 2016

Eligibility to apply

This call is open to Indian and Finnish based enterprises of all sizes (with a preference for SMEs), including research organisations working in collaboration with these enterprise partners. The minimum collaboration desired is one enterprise from India working in collaboration with one enterprise from Finland.

Finnish Applicants

In this call Tekes can fund R&D and innovation projects of companies registered in Finland, as well as company-driven RDI consortia. Examples of partners include other companies, research organizations, NGOs, customers and users, consultancies.

Company projects will be funded by Tekes according to funding terms of Tekes and the BEAM programme. The BEAM programme can provide up to 15% higher funding levels for so-called ecosystem projects that involve at least three company partners and can be expected to have more extensive societal impacts in India and possibly other countries. Further information

Indian Applicants

Eligible Indian applicants must be researchers or managers of for-profit companies that operate and are headquartered in India. Academic institutions, research hospitals, other R&D institutes (including not-for-profit research institutes recognized by DST/GITA) that are headquartered and operate in India are encouraged to participate in the projects as co-investigators/partners.

Specific criteria for eligible applicants are as follows:

The Indian Project Lead (IPL) company applying for the project must be incorporated in India under the Companies Act 2013.

The company must be at least 51% owned by Indian citizens over the total duration of the project.

The IPL should have the required expertise and team capacity to manage the proposed project.

Please note

Sole proprietors and partnership firms shall not be eligible for support under this programme.

Companies headquartered and owned outside India and their subsidiaries in India, or vice versa, are not eligible to receive funding from DST/GITA under this programme.

What kind of projects will be funded?

Information & Communication Technologies (ICT) solutions for various sectors, including Electronics System Design & Manufacturing (ESDM), for applications in various sectors

The projects must be Finnish-Indian joint projects with a common project plan. They need to build on Finnish-Indian partnerships that have high potential for commercialization and favorable societal benefit in India and other countries.

Types of projects to be funded:

Joint Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) activities including e.g. piloting, demonstration and testing.

Projects should be innovative and user- or need- driven, and they should lead to new products, services or processes with potential to commercialization while also having favourable societal impacts.

Duration of the project should not be more than 24 months

How to apply

Finnish and Indian partners apply for funding from Tekes and GITA, respectively, according to each funding organisations' practices.

Finnish and Indian co-applicants will develop a joint project plan as an appendix to the application that will be sent to both Tekes and GITA together with the funding organisation -specific documents. See guidelines for writing a joint project plan (pdf).

Indian applicants apply for funding from GITA according to the GITA's guidelines available at www.gita.org.in.

Applicants are recommended to contact their national funding organisation before submitting applications.

Review Process and Evaluation

All applications will be handled strictly confidentially.

Eligibility check

Tekes and GITA will initially screen all the applications for eligibility and completeness of information as per the guidelines provided in this document. If there are gaps in the information, Tekes and GITA may contact the applicants requesting them to provide the information required to fill in the gaps.

Thereafter, Tekes and GITA will create a list of the complete project proposals received and share it with each other. This will result in identifying projects that do/do not fulfill the eligibility criteria:

Does the proposal fall in the theme of the call?

Does the consortium include at least one Indian and one Finnish company as applicants as a minimum?

Are the applicants eligible for funding from Tekes/ DST?

If certain project proposals do not meet the eligibility criteria, Tekes and GITA will jointly discuss these proposals and find a consensus on excluding them from this call.

Review Process and Evaluation

To ensure the effective delivery of the RFP and reinforce the principles of bilateral partnership, Tekes (in collaboration with the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland) and GITA will conduct a parallel but independent review of all applications followed by a joint review.

Tekes will evaluate the applications using Tekes' normal in-house evaluation procedure, and GITA using its normal evaluation procedure with outside evaluators. To harmonise the processes, common evaluation questions will be used by both organisations. Based on both evaluation results, Tekes and GITA will form a consensus on the projects to be funded.

Assessment criteria

The joint projects must meet the general requirements of the funding organisations. The projects to be funded are chosen by evaluating them as a whole. Projects are reviewed and evaluated against the evaluation criteria as outlined below:

Following the independent evaluations in India and Finland, a joint review committee will be held, made up of representatives from both the Indian and Finnish funding and implementation agencies, and consensus on projects to be funded will be found. After that, the funding decisions will be made by the funding organisations according to their normal procedures.

Funding decisions

Tekes and GITA/DST will, after having formed their mutual understanding on the projects to be funded, make their funding decisions according to their normal procedures.

Tekes and GITA will inform their grantees about the funding decisions according to their normal practices.

To comply with the Government of India requirements, public summaries of funded projects will be published on GITA's web pages.

Administration of the funded projects

Funding granted by Tekes and GITA/DST will be governed by the general terms and conditions of each funding organisation, respectively.

Intellectual property

The Indian and Finnish applicants/participants contributing to the project should have detailed collaboration agreement including, inter alia, roles, responsibilities, contributions, IP rights, and freedom to operate commercially. This will demonstrate that all partners contributing to the RDI project have agreed in advance on IP rights and the commercialization plan for the jointly developed product or process, have the desire for cooperation, and have understood the general terms and conditions of funding of the other project parties.

The agreements shall be made in written. The draft of collaboration agreement (e.g. LOI) should be included in the project funding application.

How to find partners?

Tekes and GITA are willing to help Finnish organisations find Indian partners and Indian organisations find Finnish partners, further information will be provided upon request. Please access the GITA match portal.

Valuable information for partnering with Finnish organisations in the areas of Cleantech and ICT include:

Useful information about Finland and India

Funding organisations in nutshell

Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of IndiaThe Department of Science & Technology (DST) was established in May 1971, with the objective of promoting new areas of Science & Technology and to play the role of a nodal department for organising, coordinating and promoting S&T activities in the country. The Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of India has an important role in building a strong base for Research, Development and Demonstration in India and in addressing national concerns about strengthening science and technology. DST, as a national agency for strengthening the base of Science and Technology in the country has made sincere attempt to address national concerns of India in basic research.

Global Innovation & Technology Alliance (GITA)GITA is a "not–for–profit" Section–25 Public Private Partnership (PPP) company promoted jointly by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the Technology Development Board (TDB), Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of India (GoI).

It is an innovative mechanism between the government and Indian industry for attracting the industry's investment in technology by Mapping technology gaps, Evaluating technology offers across the globe, Connecting among technology developers, providers, commercializers, Funding last phase of technology development that connects the market and Deployment of technology solutions.

Tekes – the Finnish Funding Agency for InnovationTekes is the main public funding organisation for research and development and innovation in Finland. Tekes' funding and services promote challenging and innovative R&D projects of companies, universities and research institutes. Tekes works with the top innovative companies and research units in Finland. Annually, Tekes finances some 1,500 business R&D projects, and almost 600 public research projects. Research, development and innovation funding is targeted to projects that create in the long-term the greatest benefits for the economy and society.

Tekes actively promotes R&D&I cooperation between Finland and India, and encourages Finnish enterprises develop their businesses in India. To facilitate Indo-Finnish cooperation, Tekes collaborates with key actors of the Indian innovation ecosystem.

As a member of the Team Finland network Tekes offers partners from abroad a gateway to the Finnish innovation ecosystem.